


in the deep (and i'll always find you)

by whyyesitscar



Series: Brittana Week [6]
Category: Glee
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-11
Updated: 2013-05-11
Packaged: 2017-12-11 12:02:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/798541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whyyesitscar/pseuds/whyyesitscar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes comforting someone depends not on what you do, but what you know. Brittana, post-3x06.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in the deep (and i'll always find you)

**Author's Note:**

> Killing two birds with one stone! Written for day eight of Brittana Week (Free Day) and also filling [this prompt](http://trainwrecky.livejournal.com/1320.html?thread=57384#t57384) for the GGSM. Title lyrics come from "Mirrors" by Justin Timberlake. Set between 3x06 and 3x07. I wish I could get smuttier than this, but I have too many feels.

There are things to know about Santana.

There are things that everyone knows, like that she’s a Cheerio or in Glee Club or even though that stupid Salazar guy is trying to make it seem bad, there’s nothing wrong with the way she loves me. Then there are the things that only a few people know, like how Glee Club knows that she really likes being there and sometimes it’s an outlet for her too, and sometimes she might feel just as many feelings as Rachel and slap Finn because of them. And then there are things that only I know. I know a lot of things about Santana, but there are two that I’ve remembered for a long time.

1) She doesn’t like to cry.

2) She doesn’t like thunderstorms.

Not that she’s scared of them. But they make her uneasy. It starts with her hair, I guess, because it gets frizzy the second there’s extra humidity in the air and no matter how many times I kiss her and tell her it’s cute, she still frowns at it in the mirror. And then she’s in a grumpy mood until it stops, and she doesn’t like to talk about it, but she gets really tense, too. She’ll twist her fingers and cuddle even more than she already does (and she already cuddles _a lot_ ) and get upset when her dinner takes too long to cook or something. It’s okay, though; usually I can make her feel better with some dumb jokes or her favorite movie.

Except sometimes thunderstorms happen on days when she’s already in a bad mood, and it gets harder to cheer her up.

Sometimes she comes back from mash-up performances and changes out of her dress into a ratty tanktop without saying anything. When that happens, I wish I could turn off the sky.

But I can’t, so I put on a tanktop too and hold her until she stops feeling so anxious.

/

It takes a long time and the rain doesn’t stop.

I like the rain. I like it when it’s soft because it makes me fall asleep faster and I like when it’s really intense because then I like to pretend that I can feel the roof. It isn’t pretend anyway, I _can_ feel the roof; it’s just that no one ever believes me.

Santana does most of the time, though. I’d tell her about the roof because I don’t think I have before, but I don’t think Santana believes in a lot tonight. I know because she still isn’t asleep and I can hear her breath catch every once in a while. Like maybe she starts forgetting what happened today but then her mind brings everything back and instead of forgetting everything, she just forgets how to breathe.

“San…” I tuck her hair behind her ear, trying to soothe her with a kiss to the temple. “I could get you some earplugs if you want.”

“We don’t have any,” she says, her voice flat and absent.

“Okay, well, I bet I could make some, right? Your ears aren’t very big; I could just squish a couple cotton balls in there.” I tickle her earlobe lightly but she just shrugs me off.

“I just want to sleep, Britt.”

“That’s what you said three hours ago.”

“I still mean it. I don’t really feel like talking, B,” she sighs.

“Okay.” I pull myself closer to her, nestling my chin in the crook of her shoulder. Her neck is cold but her legs are impossibly warm where they meet mine under the covers. I wrap an arm around her stomach, sweeping it high and low. I can feel her heart beat when I pass over her chest, erratic and worried. It is a hummingbird, those last hundred meters in a race when you keep running even though it hurts, or the first hundred when you start too fast but don’t want to slow down in case someone is watching.

I wrestle Santana’s hand out from under her pillow. She has tiny fingers that never stop surprising me. They can do a lot, you know? They laugh and they fight but most importantly, they love me.

“Britt…”

I kiss the back of her hand because I can. “It’s okay, San.”

Santana doesn’t say anything. The only things I can hear are the rain and the wind because Santana’s window never really closes all the way. It’s howling, eerie and high like a lonely cat.  Sometimes I can make out Santana’s breath between the rush of air symphonies. It doesn’t keep time.

“Britt,” she repeats.

“I have something to say.”

“I really don’t want to talk." 

I shake my head, my hair rustling against the back of her neck. “I don’t need to talk. Just listen, okay?”

She sighs again and I kiss her neck. The muscles there feel so tense, like they’re working extra hard to keep her head from exploding. Sometimes I like to think that my lips are the master key that unlocks every part of Santana, even the ones she doesn’t think I can see. It’s why I don’t think I’ll ever stop wanting to kiss her.

One of my favorite parts of Santana is how even when she’s sad or angry, she still smells the same. Sometimes I think she smells better when she’s sad, or maybe that’s just because I get sad too and her shampoo always calms me down. This week, a lot of people went out of their way to point out Santana’s flaws. But here, in her bed when she’s mine until the sun comes up and even after that (just with less touching), she is perfect. She smells and tastes and feels perfect, and I won’t ever think differently of her.

I kiss her neck harder and snake a hand underneath her tanktop, ghosting my palm over the soft skin I find. Santana is always self-conscious when I touch her stomach—not because of anything bad, but she’s just really ticklish. She breathes out the higher I go, light and airy and something that might be a laugh if tonight were happy. I stop just under her breasts, feeling an invisible string connect my fingers to my lips at the back of her neck. I like to think it travels through Santana’s heart, too.

Santana turns over to face me. Her face is puffy from crying and being tired and I think she’s beautiful.

“You don’t have to be scared, Santana,” I whisper. “Not when I’m with you.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“I thought you weren’t talking.”

“I’m not,” I smile. “But those are important words and I’ll always say them, even if you don’t want me to.”

Santana smiles just a little bit. “I love you too, Britt.”

“I know,” I answer, and then I kiss her again. She is small next to me, and when I maneuver my legs on either side of her, she’s small underneath me, too. Santana gets little when she gets sad, and tonight she’s Rachel-sized—only still so much better because she’s Santana and not Rachel.

The thing about loving Santana is that she’s had sex with a lot of people. With me a bunch of times and with a bunch of boys once so I think she’s gotten mixed messages about the whole thing. When we first started fooling around, Santana had a lot of rules. The biggest one was ‘no kissing’, and it made me sad because I love kissing. I tried to ask her about it, but she would just completely shut down. I didn’t understand until we were at a party and I saw her kissing Puck, because that wasn’t kissing. It was having sex with their mouths and Santana wasn’t having fun at all. A couple weeks later she let me show her what kissing really was and now, whenever she’s sad, I make sure to remind her.

So the rain keeps falling and I kiss her, and I kiss her, and I kiss her. I kiss her cheeks, her lips, her nose, her neck, and her neck again, just because I can. I kiss across her shoulders and down, feeling her pulse beneath the curve of her breasts. I find the soft spot on her chest and kiss it because I want to hear her laugh tonight, when she doesn’t think she can.

Santana laughs, and I kiss her again.

I kiss her stomach and I smile when I feel how deep it’s rising and falling. Santana’s breaths are more like waves now, rising up when I pause for air and sinking down fast when I don’t. I’ve always loved the ocean, but Santana makes it feel new.

She tangles a hand in my hair and I take that as a sign, kissing my way back up her body while my hand replaces my mouth. She’s warm all over now, warmer still the lower my hand travels. I kiss her at the same time I slide a finger inside, stealing the gasp from her lungs. I really like it when Santana is loud, but I like it when she’s quiet, too. Santana is quiet just for me because I am not Puck or Matt or Finn. I’ve spent a lot of time learning Santana—what makes her happy or mad, what makes her yell and what makes her shut up. I’m not some boy because I know that when it comes to Santana, silence is just as important as sound. And so I keep kissing her and rock against her gently. I steal all of her noise and make sure that she knows just how much I’m loving her, just how much I will always love her.

(This is what kissing is: a promise that however much I get her worked up, she can always feel safe in my kiss; that no matter how much my fingers tease—and they always do, because it’s Santana and I can’t act any other way—my lips never will. I will never make fun of her or hurt her, but I will soothe her with silence and lots of kisses.

This is what kissing is.)

When Santana comes, it’s quiet and beautiful.

The rain stops.

/

People tell me all the time that they don’t understand how Santana and I work together because we’re really different. They don’t get it because I’m nice and she’s mean; I’m soft and she’s loud.

But she wakes me up the next morning with a kiss.

So.


End file.
